Left safe from present war, and likely doubt
Of imminent commotions to break out;
And hath he left us so? or can it be
His territory was no more than he?
No, we were all his charge; the diocese
Of every exemplar man the whole world is;
And he was joined in commission
With tutelar angels, sent to every one.
But though this freedom to upbraid, and chide
Him who triumphed, were lawful, it was tied
With this, that it might never reference have
Unto the senate who this triumph gave;
Meu might at Pompey jest, but they might not
At that authority by which he got
Leave to triumph, before by age he might;
So though, triumphant soul, I dare to write
Moved with a reverential anger, thus
That thou so early would'st abandon us,
Yet I am far from daring to dispute
With that great sovereignty, whose absolute
Prerogative hath thus dispensed with thee
'Gainst nature's laws, which just impugners be
Of early triumphs: and I (though with pain)
Lessen our loss, to magnify thy gain
Of triumph, when I say it was more fit
That all men should lack thee, than thou lack it.
Though then in our times be not suffered
That testimony of love unto the dead,
To die with them and in their graves be hid,
As Saxon Wives, and French Soldarii did;
And though in no degree I can express
Grief in great Alexander's great excess,
Who at his friend's death made whole towns divest
Their walls and bulwarks, which became them
Do not, fair soul, this sacrifice refuse,
That in thy grave I do inter my Muse,
Which by my grief, great as thy worth, being cast
Behindhand, yet hath spoke, and spoke her last.
AN ELEGY ON THE LADY MARKHAM.
1 MAN is the world, and death the ocean
To which God gives the lower parts of man.
This sea environs all, and though as yet
God hath set marks and bounds 'twixt us and it,
Yet doth it roar and gnaw, and still pretend,
And breaks our bank, whene'er it takes a friend:
Then our land-waters (tears of passion) vent;
Our waters, then above our firmament,
(Tears, which our soul doth for her sins let fall,)
Take all a brackish taste, and funeral;
And even those tears, which should wash sin,
We, after God's Noah, drown our world again.
Nothing but man, of all envenomed things, Doth work upon itself with inborn stings. ☛ Tears are false spectacles; we cannot see Through passion's mist, what we are, or what she In her this sea of death hath made no breach; But as the tide doth wash the slimy beach, And leaves embroidered works upon the sand, So is her flesh refined by death's cold hand. As men of China, after an age's stay, Do take up porcelain, where they buried clay, So at this grave, her limbec (which refines The diamonds, rubies, sapphires, pearls, and mines Of which this flesh was) her soul shall inspire Flesh of such stuff, as God, when his last fire Annuls this world, to recompense it, shall Make and name them the elixir of this all., They say, the sea, when it gains, loseth too; If carnal death (the younger brother) do Usurp the body; our soul, which subject is To the elder,death by sin, is freed by this; They perish both, when they attempt the just; For graves our trophies are, and both deaths"?
So, unobnoxious now, she hath buried both;
For none to death sins, that to sin is loth,
Nor do they die, which are not loth to die;
So hath she this and that virginity.
Grace was in her extremely diligent,
That kept her from sin, yet made her repent.
* Edd. 1633 and 1635. death's.
Of what small spots pure white complains! Alas,
How little poison cracks a crystal glass!
She sinned but just enough to let us see
That God's word must be true, all sinners be.
So much did zeal her conscience rarefy,
That extreme truth lacked little of a lie,
Making omissions acts, laying the touch
Of sin on things, that sometime may be such.
As Moses' cherubins, whose natures do
Surpass all speed, by him are winged too,
So would her soul, already in heaven, seem then
To climb by tears, the common stairs of men.
How fit she was for God, I am content
To speak, that Death his vain haste may repent:
How fit for us, how even and how sweet,
How good in all her titles, and how meet
To have reformed this forward heresy, .2
That women can no parts of friendship be;
How moral, how divine, shall not be told,
Lest they, that hear her virtues, think her old; cle
And lest we take Death's part, and make him glad
Of such a prey, and to his triumph add.
FLEGY ON MISTRESS BOULSTRED.
PRATH. I recant, and say, unsaid by me
Whate'er hath slipt, that might diminish thee:
Spiritual treason, atheism 'tis, to say,
That any can thy summons disobey.
All, tha Reserve And of One, wh She was To her
The earth's face is but thy table; there are set
Plants, cattle, men, dished for Death to eat.
In a rude hunger now he millions draws
Into his bloody, or plaguy, or starved jaws:
Now he will seem to spare, and doth more waste,
Eating the best first, well preserved to last;
Now wantonly he spoils, and eats us not,
But breaks off friends, and lets us piecemeal rot.
Nor will this earth serve him; he sinks the deep,
Where harmless fish monastic silence keep,
Who (were Death dead) the roes of living sand
Might sponge that element, and make it land.
He rounds the air, and breaks the hymnie notes
In birds', Heaven's choristers, organie throats,
Which (if they did not die) might seem to be
A tenth rank in the heavenly hierarchy.
O, strong and long-lived Death, how cam'st
thou in ?
And how without creation didst begin?
Thou hast, and shalt see dead, before thou diest,
All the four monarchies, and antichrist.
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